in reply to Re: Insert colons into a MAC address
in thread Insert colons into a MAC address

I remember when I used to think why on earth would I use a whole module if I'm just doing this one thing that can clearly be done using the built-in features of Perl. Boy, was I an idiot.


$,=qq.\n.;print q.\/\/____\/.,q./\ \ / / \\.,q.    /_/__.,q..
Happy, sober, smart: pick two.

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re^3: Insert colons into a MAC address
by mantager (Sexton) on Jan 14, 2012 at 22:44 UTC
    Well, I think I'll choose this:

    $mac =~ s/([0-9a-fA-F]{2})\B/$1:/g;

    which can be also spelled as:

    $mac =~ s/(\p{Hex}{2})\B/$1:/g;

    The [:xdigit:] class does not work (I don't know why).

    @Not_a_Number: probably there isn't a reason to prefer a regex over 'unpack' or the use of a module, in this case, since this regex is not really more readable than other methods.
    Anyway I'm more familiar with regexes than with unpack or the Net::MAC module, so there is a chanche that I will recognize and understand that sooner when looking again at my code in the future.
    As for modules, I often avoid (or completely overlook) them, because I usually have little or no control on the systems I work onto (so installing a module can be a tricky or impossible task). I see that "use a module" vs "reinvent the wheel" is an ever discussed problem. I'm on the "reinvent the wheel" side, but it's not my fault :)

    Thanks to all, bye.

    Edit:
    jut in case someone come here in the future.

    [:xdigit:]

    actually works:

    $mac =~ s/([[:xdigit:]]{2})\B/$1:/g;

    I just didn't put enough square brackets. [:xdigit:] is equivalent to [:xdigt] (literally), while [[:xdigit:]] is equivalent to [0-9a-fA-F]. Reading the f. manual helps as usual :)
[reply]
[d/l]
[select]

In Section Seekers of Perl Wisdom